


Death Eater and the Maiden

by SweetSorcery



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Canon, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Gen, Gen Fic, Heterosexuality, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Rare Pairing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-09
Updated: 2011-08-09
Packaged: 2017-10-22 10:28:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/237106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SweetSorcery/pseuds/SweetSorcery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are stranger creatures than Thestrals in the Forbidden Forest. Such as Luna Lovegood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death Eater and the Maiden

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: All canon referred to within belongs to J.K. Rowling, Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books, Raincoast Books, Warner Bros. Inc., and possibly others. Non-canon bits were created for non-profit, non-infringement entertainment.
> 
> Archiving: Absolutely nowhere except here, and not in translated form either.
> 
> Author's Notes: This was written in 2007. It's as much gen as it is het, it really depends how you wish to read it.

"Father, can we please go back inside? It's unsettling to be surrounded by these… things I can't see." Draco shivered, hugging himself.

Lucius Malfoy gave his son a disapproving look. "Do stop whingeing, Draco, and count yourself lucky that you can't."

Draco sighed. "But it's late October, and it's freezing. Why can't I go back inside while you …" He flapped his hand around. "I can't understand why you want to come here every time you visit me at school."

"I know you can't." His father sighed, for the thousandth time considering telling Draco, but not knowing even how to begin. "Very well, Draco. Go back inside. I'll come to the Slytherin common room later."

"Thank you, father!" Draco breathed a sigh of relief and marched off back towards the school. He was not yet out of ear shot when he noticed another figure walking towards him. He sneered. "What are you doing out here, Loony?"

Luna Lovegood gave him one of those irritatingly disarming smiles of hers. "Hello, Draco. Have you been visiting the Thestrals too?"

He scoffed. "Not likely. My father dragged me out here, though I don't know why." He flung the dangling end of his scarf back over his shoulder. "Anyway, no time to stand around chatting to _you_."

"Oh, of course not," Luna agreed readily. "I'm sure you must be very busy." She walked past Draco without a backwards glance, leaving him to fume about anyone walking away from him rather than the other way around. He looked back over his shoulder and smirked, consoling himself with the thought that his father would no doubt strike terror into the foolish thing's heart. Satisfied, he made his way up towards the castle.

Lucius watched the approach of the girl with a frown, having no interest in socialising with his son's schoolmates, and certainly not with anyone called 'Loony'. He didn't know what to make of her peculiar appearance - a mane of blonde hair fell over her narrow shoulders and a multi-coloured cardigan which had seen better days. It hung low over her simple skirt, and slender legs in black tights ended in a hideous pair of green boots. When he looked up, he noticed a pair of earrings fashioned to look like some kind of fruit, and around her neck hung a blue cord onto which a single pine cone had been threaded. He blinked to clear his vision, but nothing had changed.

"Good afternoon, Mr Malfoy," Luna greeted politely.

Being well bred, Lucius had no choice but to respond to the unsettling sing-song greeting, "Good afternoon, Miss…"

"Luna Lovegood." She was not looking at him, but at one of the Thestrals approaching them. Her eyes were huge and full of wonder, even though it was clear she was not unfamiliar with the sight before her.

Lucius turned his head to look up at the imposing and rather peculiar looking beast, and although none of them had ever walked up this close to him, he refused to take a step backwards. Especially in front of some slip of a girl. "Well, I must be--"

"I'm sorry you can see them too," the young witch said just as Lucius was about to leave.

"Excuse me?"

She turned her curious eyes on him, and something about her expression compelled him to remain where he was. "It would be nice if you had never seen death."

Lucius drew a deep breath, and the next words did not come to him as easily as they should. "Miss Lovegood, not only have I seen it, I have been the cause of it." There, that would send her running back to the school, quivering in fear.

She continued to look at him, not blinking even once, with an expression so dreamy, Lucius became convinced she had not even understood him. When she did at last speak, her words were certainly not what he had expected. "That must make you very sad."

He didn't know how to respond to that. He was a Death Eater. He killed on a regular basis, and for very little reason, except to prevent… He swallowed hard. He killed when he had to, and it gave him no pleasure.

The girl turned her gaze back up to the Thestral throwing its massive shadow over them. "He looks as if he recognizes you. You've come here many times," she said. "I think he likes you."

Lucius was beginning to see all too clearly how she had come by her nickname. "What are you talking about?" he asked with a hint of annoyance. The girl smiled, and it made her look rather like a very peculiar pixie. When she reached out and took Lucius' hand, he was too shocked to react. People did not simply touch him, and certainly not without his permission, and it took him a moment to realise she was pressing his hand to the Thestral's long neck, using it to stroke the beast.

"Miss Lovegood, kindly--"

"You've definitely been here many times. He's only allowed me to touch him after I kept visiting for months," she informed Lucius with a brief sideways glance. "Did you know that Thestrals are rather like dogs? They can tell good people from bad ones."

Lucius snorted. "Then I'm afraid this one is delusional."

"No, I don't think so," Luna disagreed. "Animals are quite a lot smarter than people, you know. And it can be difficult to judge ones own character."

Unable to take it anymore, Lucius pulled his hand back from her light grasp, startling the Thestral if not the girl. "Now look here, _Child_ , you have no idea what you're talking about. You don't know me, and trust me - you don't want to know me. If you did, you would put as much distance between us as humanly possible."

She smiled as if he'd just paid her a compliment. Clearly, she was not merely loony, but stark raving mad. "You don't know me either, Mr Malfoy. Perhaps we should get to know each other better."

He stared at her, about to inform her that not only did her subtlety leave much to be desired, but that he was old enough to be her father and had no intention whatsoever to embark on a liaison with a girl who was a few sparks short of a full spell. But the words never made it out of his mouth, and when she merely continued to smile guilelessly up at him, he blinked and rubbed his temple. It was abundantly clear there had been nothing illicit about her suggestion at all, and that somehow, the girl managed to go through life simply saying whatever came into her head without considering that people like him might take advantage of her. Somebody, he thought, ought to look after this girl.

As if the shock of that thought had sapped the strength from his legs, he did something he had not done since he'd been a child - he sat down on the thick foliage covering the ground without a moment's consideration for propriety or the state of his clothes.

"Oh good, we'll have a nice chat!" Luna planted herself at his side without waiting for an invitation.

He glanced at her and couldn't help himself. A soft laugh made it unbidden out of his mouth.

She beamed at him and tucked her dark grey skirt over her knees, then proceeded to tell him all about which house she was in, what her favourite classes were, how much she envied Draco's marks in Potions, and that, since the beginning of the school year, she had mysteriously lost three pairs of shoes, her new winter cloak, two scarves, a night dress, a powder blue hairbrush, a pewter miniature of the Sorting Hat, and a tea mug which sang Irish folk songs when filled to the brim.

Lucius, to his own surprise, found himself listening with rapt attention to the kind of nonsense he would never normally deign worthy of attention. Though, if he was honest, it was not only what she was telling him, but how she was speaking. Her soft, dreamy voice lulled him into a state of such calm that by the time she was finished, he felt as if he was under a siren's spell. And then he realized what she had said at the very end.

"The school year only started six weeks ago," he pointed out. When she nodded, he asked shrewdly, "Do your personal possessions have a habit of disappearing?"

Luna shrugged, seeming not the least bit perturbed. "Yes, every year, but they tend to turn up again just before the summer holidays."

Something quite disturbing jolted through Lucius. Something suspiciously like protectiveness. While he was still wondering how to break it to her that her disappearing possessions were almost certainly due to some miscreants wishing her ill, she spoke again.

"I know people hide them, of course," she said. "But it's all in good fun."

"Good fun?" Lucius hissed. When Luna gave him a surprised look - though it was hard to tell with her, really - he schooled his features carefully. "I thought Ravenclaw was meant to house the intelligent students?"

"Oh, I'm not stupid," she said mildly. "I just don't think there's much point making a fuss about--"

"Not _you_ , girl!" Lucius spat, then cleared his throat. "I'm sorry. But I assure you, I was not referring to you, but to your brattish house mates."

Luna beamed at him, and he felt his anger draining from him. "Well, now that you know a little bit about me, I think you should tell me about yourself, Mr Malfoy."

The smile died on Lucius' face, and his blood froze. He averted his eyes. "You don't want me to do that."

"Yes, I do. After all, we can't really become good friends if you know me, but I know nothing about you, can we?"

He smiled sadly, but still did not look at her again. "Friends, Miss Lovegood?" When he had woken up that morning, the world had been quite definitely the right way up - or at least what he had come to think of as 'right' by way of habit. Yet here he was, a mere matter of hours later, sitting on damp leaves in the Forbidden Forest with a strange pixie-girl determined to be his friend.

"I think you should call me Luna," she said, either unaware of, or unconcerned with, his confusion.

Lucius looked at her long and hard. She was sitting very close to him, smelling like honeysuckle and wild berries. Her bright blue eyes shone in the dappled sunlight falling on them through the sparse treetops. A strand of hair almost as pale as his own obscured half of her left eye, and he reached out and lifted it away, tucking it behind her ear.

She smiled at him. "May I call you Lucius?" He nodded before he could think better of it. "Why do you come here to see the Thestrals?"

He quickly withdrew the hand which had remained hovering above her head and looked away towards the grazing animals. "That is none of your business, Miss Lovegood." He sighed. "Luna."

"Well, I wouldn't be much of a friend if I didn't care, would I?" She sounded so damnably reasonable.

"Do you really want to know?" Lucius asked against his better judgement.

"Of course."

He sighed. "I come here so I never forget-- I hope it will prevent me from growing numb to what I-- the things I do."

"Things like 'causing death'?" Her voice was gentle and not in the least accusatory, even though it most definitely should be.

Lucius closed his eyes and nodded. When she said nothing further, he started to talk about his parents, about never having been good enough for them until his indoctrination into the Dark Lord's inner circle, about how sickened he had been when he had realized what was expected of him, about attempting to leave so many times that enduring the Cruciatus had become a habit.

Luna reached out and began to stroke his hair, all the way down his back, silently encouraging him to go on. She listened to him recounting his relief at the Dark Lord's apparent defeat by a one year old baby. Relief, because his sole heir - sired with a woman chosen for him before he had even learned to speak - was no longer in constant danger. Luna said nothing about the tear leaking from the corner of one silver-grey eye, merely continued to stroke his hair soothingly.

"And now he's returned," Lucius finally managed, his voice breaking, and he found he did not care. "And as if no time has passed at all, I am expected to do his bidding once again, or--"

"Pay with your family's lives," Luna whispered.

Lucius looked at her, swallowed heavily, and nodded. "And worst of all - my own son has no idea he is merely a piece in the Dark Lord's game. Draco wants desperately to follow in my footsteps!" He might have laughed at the absurdity of it, had he felt able to.

Luna sighed. She at last stopped stroking Lucius' hair, and he felt the loss of her touch keenly, but then she reached out her small hand to tenderly swipe the tears from his high cheekbones.

Then, and only then, did Lucius become aware of just how much this still, otherworldly girl had wrung out of him, and he lowered his eyes in shame. The escaping tear sunk into the skin of her fingertip when it had barely cleared his lashes. "Forgive me, Luna," he murmured. "I should not have--"

"Hush." She shifted to her knees, then awkwardly wrapped her arms as far around Lucius' broad shoulders as they would go. Holding him close, she let him rest his head on her shoulder and fold his arms around her small waist. There was very little heat left in the specks of sunlight slowly travelling over their still forms. And yet, neither felt cold or uncomfortable while they sat huddled there until the songs of starlings slowly gave way to the hooting of owls.

When Lucius finally raised his head and looked into Luna's sympathetic eyes, he felt as if he could breathe freely for the first time in his life. "I had no idea it was so good to have a friend." It was the first thing that came into his head, and judging by her smile, it had been the perfect thing to say.

"We should go inside," she said softly. "Draco will start to worry that I might have hexed you."

The suggestion was so utterly absurd and uniquely hers that Lucius could not help but laugh out loud. Reluctantly, he untangled himself from Luna, then stood up and offered his hand to her, already regretting the loss of her warmth. She allowed him to pull her up and brushed a few leaves first from his cloak, then from her own skirt and cardigan. She smiled at him and started walking in the direction of the school, and Lucius fell into step beside her.

"You know, Lucius," she said just as they cleared the trees. "Harry Potter is going to defeat the Dark Lord." She smiled up at him. "And then you'll be free again."

He returned her smile hesitantly, wishing he possessed even half her faith. But he was willing to try.

Once they were close to the castle, Lucius stopped her with one hand on her arm and drew out his wand. Luna watched him with interest as he flourished it with the words, "Accio Luna Lovegood's stolen property!"

"Oh, I can't believe I never thought of that!" She laughed happily, holding out her arms as, one by one, her things came zooming out of the front door and towards her.

Lucius caught the potentially injury-causing items and added them to the pile of fabric in Luna's arms, then shrunk the lot with a quick spell. He pulled a large silk handkerchief from his pocket, piled the miniatures on top of it in the palm of his hand, tied it up, and gave it to Luna.

She smiled at him. "Thank you, Lucius! Now I must do something nice for you as well."

He swallowed, wishing he could see her eyes properly in the beginning twilight, and wishing he knew why something warm and expectant was fluttering in his stomach. He waited and watched as she dropped her possessions in the shapeless pocket of her cardigan before lifting her peculiar pinecone necklace from around her neck.

"I'm sorry I have nothing better to give you, but this is quite useful. The scent of pines keeps nargles away," she chattered. "And if you ever feel like you need cheering up, you can burn the pine cone. The smell is very soothing."

Lucius chuckled softly, shaking his head ever so slightly. He leaned down towards her, inhaling her honeysuckle scent while she looped the cord around his neck. When he straightened himself up again, he closed his hand around the pine cone and smiled at her. He had no idea what a nargle was, but he knew that merely to think of her would cheer him up. "Trust me, Luna, I will never burn this as long as I live."

It was hard to tell in the dying light, but it was just possible that Luna was blushing.

 

THE END


End file.
